World Cup Live Report - Bangladesh vs Sri Lanka

All anyone will talk about when they look back on this game is the Angelo Mathews timed out dismissal.

He was at the crease within the two-minute deadline -- but before he could take strike, the strap on his helmet broke and he needed more time.

According to the World Cup playing conditions, if you aren't ready to face the ball in two minutes, you're out.

The ICC has pointed out that they believe the strap broke after the two-minute grace period had passed. I'm not so sure though. It still feels like Mathews had extenuating circumstances. How was he to know the helmet strap would break? He should, however, have been quicker to get to the crease. Why cut it so close? Why wasn't he ready when the wicket fell? We've seen batters in T20 cricket decked out in their full kit waiting for their turn to bat. No excuses there.

Bangladesh sensed an opportunity to get ahead in the game. Shakib appealed and stuck to the appeal and then came back to play an innings that would only reinforce just how much he believes that he was in the right. Each of his 82 runs off just 62 balls was dripping with purpose. He wanted this to finish with him on the winning side. And it has.

With 53 balls remaining.

Even if Mathews had made a contribution besides 0 (0) that's enough of a cushion for Bangladesh to feel good about this game. They are back where they need to be to qualify for the 2025 Champions trophy - the top eight teams from this tournament get in. Nobody else allowed. SL are at No. 8 now after this loss but they're hanging by a thread.

Theekshana strikes again. Mehidy gone. Bangladesh still need 11 to win. There's life in this game yet

Mahmudullah and Mushfiqur Rahim are out. Sri Lanka's coach Chris Silverwood is up off his seat, clapping. He's loving the fight the team is showing.

Bangladesh still need 24 runs to win.

There's no run-rate pressure.

BUT this is the last recognised batting pair. Mehidy is in with Hridoy.

Mendis going even harder - he's brought back his strike bowler Madushanka to bowl his eighth over to try and break this partnership. And it almost worked.

Mahmudullah pulled a short ball from around the wicket to long leg, except the fielder down there, Chameera had come in too far. The ball in the end sailed over him for six, but had he been on the rope, he had a catching opportunity. SL dropped Shakib when he was new at the crease too and he went on to almost score a hundred

Bangladesh, right through this game, from the toss, when they said they expected dew and that's why they chased, and even with the Mathews timed out dismissal, have been alert to every opportunity that's come their way and they've taken it with both hands.

SL not so much. They have reason to feel aggrieved though.

Mathews has picked up two wickets in eight balls without giving up a run.

Sri Lanka are not going quietly into the night.

Shanto gone for 90. Mahmudullah and Mushfiqur Rahim, two very experienced players are in, but they're going to feel the full force of a Sri Lanka team raging against the events of today.

Since Rajitha's 19-run over in the 30th, SL have given up only 10 runs in four overs and dispatched both set batters

Mathews was bowling with a slip in that 34th over. SL know wickets are the need of the hour and they're chasing em hard.

And celebrates by placing his his forefinger on his wrist, as if he's signalling time. This will probably paint the rivalry between Sri Lanka and Bangladesh for years to come.

The Shakib-Shanto partnership ends at 169 off 147 balls. Bangladesh still need 70 from 18 overs.

Nineteen runs off the 30th over from Kasun Rajitha and now both batters are eying centuries.

Shakib 81 off 60. Shanto 86 off 93. Rajitha 4-0-47-0

This partnership is threatening to become Bangladesh's highest for any wicket in a World Cup match. Litton Das and Shakib put on 189 in the 2019 tournament against West Indies.

Six Sri Lankans including the captain Mendis and senior player Mathews have rounded on the two umpires at the end of the 26th over. It's a long conversation. Maybe about the nature of the ball? Shakib eavesdrops on it. Eventually he's asked to move away. The Sri Lankans don't look like a happy team out there. They're feeling like everything is going against them.

A first fifty in this World Cup for Shakib as well.

His scores previously: 43, 5, 1, 40, 1 and 14

Stick him in the middle of a controversy and he comes up with the bigs.

He's been all action in this innings. When Mathews came on to bowl in the 11th over, and mouthed the word "timed out", Shakib responded by charging at him. That resulted in a catching opportunity and Asalanka dropped it at short cover.

Tempers were flaring around that time and it seemed to feed Shakib. He launched Dushmantha Chameera for a six over the keeper's head. He was gagging to run quick singles, had to be sent back by the much more calm Shanto.

When Shakib feels like the world is against him, he starts feeling like he needs to prove em all wrong, and just casually turns into a world-beater.

He was 18 off 30 with 2x4s at one point.

He's now 56 off 59 with 9x4s.

He's basically flipped a switch and scored 38 runs in 29 balls.

Conditions have flattened out. The dew is helping the ball onto the bat.

Bangladesh's chances of victory are up at 73.42%

Shanto and Shakib have put fifty together. And every time they hit the ball to the boundary, it got wet. There's dew on the ground. And it affected the ball so much that after the last boundary in that sequence, in the 17th over of the chase, the umpires decided to change the ball.

Meanwhile, Sri Lanka are falling foul of time again. They are four overs behind.

Bangladesh 97 for 2. Shakib 28 (30). Shanto 30 (45). Their changes of victory is up at 52.50%

Sadeera Samarawickrama, who is fielding at short cover, and the non-striker Najmul Hossain Shanto just got into a shouting match that required the standing umpire Richard Illingworth to step in and separate them in the 14th over

Bangladesh 75 for 2. Their chances of winning according to ESPNcricinfo's forecaster is 43.74%

Here's the battle everyone wanted to see.

Mathews got one past Shakib - a charging Shakib - and if my lip-reading skills are as good as I think Mathews brought up the "time out".

Next ball, Shakib charges again and nearly gets out. The lash he meant to go for four only went as far as short cover where Charith Asalanka drops the catch.

Sri Lanka have also been trying to bounce out Shakib. Chameera spent a good part of the 10th over trying that. Absolutely no love lost.

Shakib is feeding off of all that energy though. He likes Sri Lanka coming at him. He shows it in the 12th over when he steps across his off stump and pulls Chameera over the fine leg boundary. This needle has brought the whole game alive.

Madushanka struck in the third over of the innings - he could have had two in that over - the four was a dropped catch.

The batter who was reprieved - Litton Das - was nailed in the seventh in spectacular fashion. An inswinging yorker that tailed late and thudded into his left boot before the bat even came down.

Special ball from a special talent. 20 wickets in the World Cup so far, puts him right on top of the charts.

The inswing he gets hits very late because his slingy action actively pushes the ball across right-handers. I wrote about that earlier in this tournament. When there is swing, this is an invaluable asset. When there isn't any swing, it might actually work against him, giving batters room to hit him through the off side.

Madushanka might well be the success story that saves the blushes for Sri Lanka when this tournament is all done and dusted. A 23-year old carrying a former world champion by taking a chart-topping 19 wickets in eight innings.

Madushanka dismisses Tanzid Hasan and could've had Litton Das too, for just 6, had Kusal Perera on the long leg boundary taken a fairly simple chance.

This game has huge Champions Trophy implications. Bangladesh are currently outside the top-eight cut-off on the points table. That may explain the desperation that came into play when they dismissed Angelo Mathews timed out. Sri Lanka are within that top-eight right now and may stay there even with a loss. Their NRR Is better than Netherlands' with whom they'll be tied on points

He came in early, during a spell where Bangladesh took two wickets in two overs.

He shepherded them through the flashpoint created by the Angelo Mathews timed out.

He's also had to bat with the tail all through the death overs.

All of that has dictated the way he has had to play - which is to say he's had to avoid taking too many risks.

Even then he brought up a century at almost a run a ball and a control percentage of 90. It's been a backs to the wall, old fashioned, gritty innings.

While Asalanka was at the crease, Sri Lanka made 206 runs in 36 overs at a rate of 5.72. He himself scored 108 of them (52%) at a rate of 6.17. And he did this essentially by running himself ragged. Asalanka had 41 singles when he brought up his century, alongside four twos and a three.

The benefit of breaking into the tail is showing. Theekshana is 17 off 26 in the 45th over.

Only 29 runs in the five overs between 41 and 45.

Both of the SL batters are trying hard. Theekshana, in fact, has hit three of the four boundaries that have in the final powerplay.

They understand the value of batting their full quota and they're trying to balance that with getting the boundaries they need to post a reasonable target.

And now Theekshana is gone. 21 off 31. SL have four overs to improve on the 258 they currently have on the board. Asalanka is 91 off 96.

And it's a key breakthrough because he's taken Bangladesh into the SL tail with 12 overs still left.

The broadcast showed that 45% of Mehidy's deliveries today were hitting the top of the stumps. That means he's not giving the drive ball, nor is he giving the horizontal bat shot.

He's probably done that by sacrificing some of his turn, but this ball, he does give it a rip and it sneaks between the advancing Dhananjaya's bat and pad and leaves him stumped.

Away from the spotlight, Sri Lanka's best batter of the day has helped himself to a landmark.

He is also leading their last recognised batting pair in a fifty-plus partnership.

Charith Asalanka has stayed cool in the middle of a cauldron.

There's such upheaval in his dressing room. Everyone has blank faces. They cannot believe the Mathews wicket. The head coach Silverwood was seen talking to the fourth umpire Holdstock.

Mathews was seen still explaining the situation, to his team-mates this time, about his strap and then flicking his hand in a there's no sense in what just happened kind of way.

Here's a list of unusual dismissals in cricket - essentially handled the ball and obstructing the field.

Also, from our social team, Mathew Varghese, points out how Sourav Ganguly once took six minutes to come on the field, but wasn't timed out in a Test match in 2007. This is a write-up from that game on ESPNcricinfo

India's efforts weren't helped by a mix-up which saw Tendulkar halted on his way to the crease at the fall of the second wicket. He had spent 18 minutes off the field the previous day, and only 13 of them had been used up, so he was not permitted to bat at that point. Tendulkar was sent back into the pavilion and Ganguly, who was not even dressed in whites, was asked to bat as Laxman was caught with his pants down - literally - in the toilet. Some seven minutes passed while Ganguly dressed himself and made his way to the crease, during which time Daryl Harper explained to Smith that, as the Indian team had only just been told of the problem, an appeal for Timed Out "would not be entertained".

Whoa!

Sri Lanka are 135 for 5!

And they're five down because Angelo Mathews has been timed out. It is the first-ever timed-out dismissal in international cricket (men/women). Has happened only six times before in any format, all in first-class cricket

And he pleaded his case. He said the strap of his helmet wasn't working and that's why he needed the extra time. Someone had brought him a replacement, but it didn't happen quickly enough.

The 2023 World Cup playing conditions state a new batter needs to be ready to face their first ball within two minutes of arriving. (The laws of the game say three minutes tho) Mathews wasn't.

It appeared as though Mathews had walked into the field within those two minutes, but as he was preparing to take strike, he found the strap of his helmet wasn't working properly so he asked for a new one and that was the reason for the delay.

The end result is Mathews didn't take strike within the allowed two minutes' time. So Bangladesh appealed. And that was that.

Mathews tried to talk to Shakib. Shakib responded pleasantly enough but did not withdraw the appeal. The decision's made now. But SL aren't happy. Mathews threw his helmet away in disappointment as he walked back. Mendis was seen talking to the Bangladesh coach and former SL player Chandika Hathurusinghe about it, about the helmet not working properly.

Waqar Younis from the commentary box says "this is not good for the game. It is against the spirit of cricket"

Ramiz Raja, also on air, says "that incident might make Sri Lanka play with a bit of passion here, play with a bit of anger."

Oops. Looks like I put the mockers on him.

Samarawickrama, right after smashing Shakib for a four on the leg side, times the pants off another big hit only he forgot to place it.

The reason that sweep shot went for four, even though it was mostly top edge, is because he was conscious of keeping it fine.

This shot, the perfectly timed, exquisite looking down the track loft, goes squarer, right where the man on the boundary is placed. Mahmudullah didn't have to move

Once again, Bangladesh have broken a partnership that was looking to define the game.

Nissanka and Mendis added 61 off 63 earlier and they were taken down.

Samarawickrama and Asalanka had added 63 off 70 and they have been taken down too.

There is this thing that Sadeera Samarawickrama has done better than any other batter in this World Cup.

Smashing spin through cover and point.

Now that by itself is okay. Tying in with that has been his improved play on the leg side.

Until the start of 2023, he averaged 9 against balls - pace or spin - arriving on the stumps. Since the start of 2023, he averages five times that - 45

All this good work was visible in the 18th over, when Samarawickrama took a risk, but its a risk that works in his favour, it plays to his strengths, as he went inside out and against the turn to score a four over cover against the offspin of Mehidy Hasan.

The next ball, he knew would be tighter to the stumps, so he took another calculated risk, he shuffled across his crease and swept it for four. Samarawickrama spoke about this evolution starting in the LPL, where he said moving around in his crease has helped him access more areas of the ground.

As Andrew Fidel Fernando found out when Charith Asalanka came in and rescued Sri Lanka in the middle of a previous wobble in the Asia Cup...

That's 40 innings' worth of work from a difficult batting position. He averages 42 and strikes at 88. He knows how to nurse an innings back to health.

And now the set batter is gone. Nissanka chops on playing that drive that he looks so good playing. Bangladesh have got right back into this game in the space of two overs from Shakib and World Cup debutant Tanzim.

SL 72 for 3 after 13 overs. Of that 72, Nissanka made 41 off 36 balls. Two new batters now for Bangladesh and Shakib especially to squeeze.

Eeeexcept Shakib takes himself out of the attack despite picking up a wicket. So what do I know? Is it because the new batter, Asalanka, is a left-hander?

Kusal Mendis had taken the counter there with a big hit off Tanzim Hasan in the 11th over. Until then, he was 7 off 23 balls. A large part of that is because he got stuck in Taskin's end. That head to head alone was 4 off 19

Kusal was trying to break free and he did for a little while, but going for six number 465 against the wily Shakib Al Hasan, he got caught on the long-on boundary.

Taskin is doing very well so far on a pitch that looks like a belter.

And the only thing he's focused on is pulling his length back - 9 of his 18 balls are either good or short of a good length and SL have scored a grand total of just one run off these deliveries.

He's consciously not offering anything drivable... except for the last ball of his third over, which is driven straight down the ground with a touch of class by Nissanka.

The overall point though is this, with the new ball, looks a hit through the line pitch and Taskin has tried not to allow that and has figures of 3-1-6-0. The other end is leaking runs though. 4-0-31-1.

Story of Bangladesh's World Cup campaign. If something goes well, something else goes wrong.

Sri Lanka rate Pathum Nissanka very highly and in the course of the third over of this innings he's shown exactly why.

Three purer shots you cannot find - the first a back foot punch between cover and point, where he waited for the ball to come right under his eyes so he could have full control over it. The next, a pristine straight drive to a ball that was maybe ever so slightly overpitched. And finally a cover drive to make the angels swoon, to a ball that really did not merit such treatment.

Beautiful weight transfer with all three shots.

All this against a bowler who's won this match up previously - Shoriful Islam had taken Nissanka out twice in 23 balls in ODIs, for the cost of only 19 runs

He has a history of doing it with the bat, across formats.

Here, just as Kusal Perera was finding his range, he takes him out with a blinder of a catch. One-handed, leaping to his left, pretty much in front of first slip.

That's splendid athleticism. Mushfiqur was parallel to the ground when he snaffled it on the webbing of his glove.

Shoriful Islam strikes in the first over with a fairly ordinary delivery - on a length, very wide, asking to be hit.

This means only Netherlands and South Africa are yet to start their bowling innings with a first-over wicket.

4.61

Bangladesh's scoring rate in the ODI World Cup, the slowest of all the participating teams. Their batting average of 24.01 is only better than England (23.41) and Netherlands (21.01)

42

Wickets taken by Bangladesh in the ODI World Cup, once again the fewest of all the participating teams. Both departments have gone for a toss and that's why they've found it so hard to compete.

6.42

Sri Lanka's economy rate in the World Cup, making their bowling unit the most expensive one in the tournament. They've also only taken 45 wickets. As much as the focus will be on their 55 all out, some of their batters - Kusal Mendis (against SA), Kusal Perera (against Aus), Sadeera Samarawickrama (against Pak) did put on a show of their skill. Their downfall is built around the fact that apart from the young Dilshan Madushanka (18 wickets, next best is just 8) none of the bowlers have really performed to potential.

Shakib points out that at training they saw dew in the evenings so they'd prefer chasing and take advantage of the conditions. One change. Mustafiz is not fit enough, in his place Tanzim Hasan is in

Kusal Mendis says he doesn't mind batting first on a pretty good wicket. Two changes. Dhananjaya de Silva and Kusal Perera are in for Dushan Hemantha and Dimuth Karunaratne

Remember there is still something other than a semi-final spot to play for here. A spot in the 2025 Champions trophy. Pakistan are in by virtue of being the hosts. They will be joined by those who finish in the top eight here. Everybody else - and that right now includes England and Bangladesh - will not be involved.

Bangladesh: 1 Litton Das, 2 Tanzid Hasan, 3 Najmul Hossain Shanto, 4 Mushfiqur Rahim (wk) 5 Mahmudullah, 6 Shakib Al Hasan (capt), 7 Mehidy Hasan Miraz, 8 Towhid Hridoy , 9 Taskin Ahmed, 10 Tanzim Hasan, 11 Shoriful Islam

Sri Lanka: 1 Pathum Nissanka, 2 Kusal Perera, 3 Kusal Mendis (capt, wk), 4 Sadeera Samarawickrama, 5 Charith Asalanka, 6 Angelo Mathews, 7 Dhananjaya de Silva, 8 Maheesh Theekshana, 9 Kasun Rajitha, 10 Dushmantha Chameera, 11 Dilshan Madushanka